I passed a great part of Tuesday, the twenty-first of March, in discussing with some political friends the intolerable situation of things at Paris, effected by the triumphal mob of Saturday, the eighteenth. We all deplored and denounced that unjustifiable attempt 128 at the national sovereignty which suddenly drew on us the danger of Prussian occupation of the city and the horrors of civil war--perhaps both of these scourges. Our indignation was profound. One blamed the government for having too readily abandoned Paris to the danger of insurrection; another maintained that by establishing itself at Versailles with the national assembly, and defending the environs of Paris, it saved France. Another declaimed with bitterness, sometimes against the culpable indifference of the national guards, which left everything to be done, and sometimes against the audacity and wickedness of the leaders of the mob that, without any pretext, was dragging France, all bleeding from the wounds incurred in war, into a bottomless abyss. We all felt there was something beneath all this: it was the shameful defection of a part of the troops of the line which had rendered such cruel misfortunes possible. If the army were to countenance the insurrection, that would decide the fate of France--_Galliæ finis!_ It was easier to deplore the gravity of the evil than to point out a practical means of remedying it. There was great diversity of opinion respecting the latter. Should recourse be had to material force or to a spirit of persuasion and conciliation? The use of material force might inflame the rebellious party still more, and cover Paris with blood and ruins. The success of moral influence was hardly possible with insurgents who began by assassinating Generals Lecomte and Clément Thomas, and deliberately advocated a social revolution.